Las Vegas Sphere Owner Hits Beyoncé With Cease And Desist Over 'Unauthorized' Use Of Venue In Tour

Yahoo

05-05-2025

Beyoncé has just kicked off her "Cowboy Carter" tour, but there's already trouble at the rodeo.
According to sources close to the owner of the famed Las Vegas Sphere, which opened in September 2023, they have sent Beyoncé a cease and desist letter over her "unauthorized" use of their venue in her tour's interlude visuals.
During the opening night of Beyoncé's "Cowboy Carter" tour on April 28, fans noticed the Las Vegas Sphere in one of the interlude visuals.
In the stunning graphic, the "II Hands II Heaven" singer is depicted as hundreds of feet tall, striding through Sin City before stopping at the Sphere. She then lowers down before picking the venue up, tapping it with one finger, and walking away with it in her hand.
Although the clip had Beyoncé fans buzzing with speculation online, Madison Square Garden boss James Dolan wasn't pleased with the 43-year-old's use of the building in her visuals.
'Beyoncé — many orders of magnitude larger than the Sphere venue — leans over, picks up the venue, and looms over it,' Kathleen McCarthy, a lawyer representing Dolan, wrote in a statement obtained by The Post.
McCarthy went on to say that Bey's interlude has caused "significant speculation" that she would end her tour with a "Sphere residency."
The letter, addressed to Beyoncé's production company, Parkwood Entertainment, asked the singer to stop using footage of the venue "without permission" so that it wouldn't confuse fans.
"It has recently come to SEG's attention that a Cowboy Carter tour interlude video contains the unauthorized use of SEG's intellectual property," the letter states. "SEG is sure that multiple aspects of the interlude video, including other brands, clips, and music, were duly cleared by the tour with rights permissions from the rights holders whose works were used in the video, as is common practice. SEG, however, was never asked, and the prominent appearance and manipulation of SEG's Sphere venue in the video is unauthorized."
Social media users immediately reacted to the legal matter and defended the "Dangerously In Love" singer vigorously in different threads.
Tami Roman from MTV's "The Real World" and VH1's "Basketball Wives" commented, "The way I heard tourism was down [and] people aren't even going to the sphere ... they might wanna let her help with free promo [and] visibility."
Someone else commented, "Now why would you block your blessings?"
A third user also shared their thoughts and assumed Dolan was upset over previous rumors that Beyoncé declined the opportunity to perform a residency at the Sphere in 2024.
"Oh, he mad she ain't wanna do that residency," they wrote.
Another user suggested Beyoncé pull the footage of the Sphere from her interlude, "and then never perform there."
During the first night of Beyoncé's "Cowboy Carter" tour, which occurred at SoFi Stadium in California, Beyoncé surprised attendees with a few of her family members.
Blue Ivy Carter, who was featured in the "RENAISSANCE WORLD TOUR" and "Beyoncé Bowl" on Netflix, joined her mother on stage throughout various parts of the three-hour performance. But she wasn't the only Carter on stage.
Rumi Carter also stood by her mother's side during her performance of "PROTECTOR," in which the former can be heard saying on the studio version of the song, "Mom, can I hear the lullaby, please?"
While off stage, some fans were involved in a heated exchange that turned physical, sending concertgoers into a panic.
Two women, dressed head-to-toe in their best Western-inspired get-up, were seen arguing with each other near the VIP section of the concert before one of them smacked a hat off their other's head.
Later, someone else swooped into the encounter, pushing another to the floor.
One bystander could be heard calling the situation "a mess," while another joked, "Another show after the Beyoncé show?"